it's been a year since i've written a good poem

It's your clothes strewn across the bedroom floor

it's the extra ache in your knees as you climb the stairs - one flight too many

it's the drum in your heart that resounds through your chest

and the ropes tighten, clenched fists and grinding teeth

but no anger, just the tension.

That the giving, sometimes for things that no one ever even asked for

nips away at the wool that wraps my bones.

Not knowing it was winter because I didn't know what day it was.

gliding on ice skates across a mirror but never being able to look down 

Too much of one can crush the other - be careful.

The freedom of loneliness (n): 

A brisk chill on what should be a bright spring day;

A beach with gray sand and a sunset like the day after a wildfire;

A plane to return home from whence you sprouted and thrived;

A detachment that always felt to good to be true.

There were things that happened when I was with you,

And now that I'm older, I've thought things through.

The mind remembers less than the heart,

But the electric currents are years apart.

Acceptance; breathing for myself again

Today

I crawled between the corner of where the highway meets the air

and for a second the cars are floating on asphalt

because really, how does that even make sense?

I stared at the cigarette butts and tiny pieces of who knows what

non-biodegradable material scattered

between the blades of grass

Plastic bags dangling from dandelion brambles and bushes

holding on forever maybe

but no one knows about this place

or even cares to know

so if I stay here forever,

who's to say that every day isn't today?

Confronting Conflict

You said I was as sweet as vanilla

but only when it's straight from the bottle. 

You bit me,

your lips sewn with fleece so it did not sting.

    And why do you set the water temperature

    to steam when its ninety-two degrees and 

    the shower curtain is embarrassed by 

    its incapability to block out the sun?

You lather to rid impurities

but I've lost track of which

of the droplets skating on your skin

were tossed down from the piping stream

or had risen out of biological response.

   You're pure and your intentions reflect it,

   Though the consequence is to inadvertently craft a 

   an alluring morass of paradoxical scenes   

   left for me to untangle.

What I would give to wriggle my tiny body

into your ear, following the electric paths to arrive

inside of your mind - just a peek

The reality: a discomfort of never being able to understand.

   

A little angry

I want to know that the validity of my emotion has to do with me and me alone
I’m tired of you only caring when my sadness has to do with someone else
That when I “update” you on my “relationship status”
Your disappointment in my endings are filled with more sympathy
Than when I called you crying at the age of 12
Because your brother could never do what I said happened
Until you understood
But that’s the thing about having pride as an adult
We don’t do “apologies”
No
That would mean we were wrong

on the metro in Paris

Falling in love with strangers in public

Is a much safer way to fall in love

A fleeting moment

Eye contact

Temporary butterflies

Everchanging motion

And just like that

You’re both on your merry ways

Like pressing your thumb into a sunburn

Just for a second 

You feel the warm pressure 

and see the yellow glow

But as soon as you let it go

It disappears

written for music

I know you feel trapped

Because surprisingly enough

I do know what it feels like

To feel like that

One ocean away

It doesn’t seem so far

But hearing your voice

Leaves me no choice

It’s hard to know that

No matter where we go

There will always be that one thing

That keeps us apart 

But I’ll keep growing, moving, loving

And I’m sorry that sometimes you didn’t see that part of me

Home is still home without you 

Torn between letting go and keeping it in

No matter what we both can’t win

The distance washes away the pain

Maybe you’ll come home someday

What you (maybe) never understood

I write to you not because I miss you
Even though that’s true sometimes.
I write to you because there will always be words floating in the air between us,
Even if that physical air has no oxygen
No way for you to inhale it
It is still thick like the fog that you have left my mind in for a long time now
And even though your words cut like edges of this paper on my fragile fingertips
I know you feel it too and you can’t convince me otherwise
Because on average it takes someone 17 months to get over someone.
But getting over you has been one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do.
Case closed.
And I think you may treat me differently if you had seen yourself the way that I saw you.
Maybe you wouldn’t be so angry.
Maybe you would understand why I held on for so long.
Maybe you would understand.


When I watched you in the rain
You said it was the first time you saw a downpour
Your childish excitement and curiosity about the sky
I wondered if it felt the way that you felt when you told me about you
I know why I made you feel so special
Because I basically knew nothing
But watching you love something that you had never seen
It made it all make sense

I’m sure the electric energy in my eyes was the same
When you showed me your favorite poem
Reading Rumi
Finding comfort in the language of love
Learning words have no translation
Feeling a part of something new -
Driving you into Manhattan
Coming from your first airport visit where customs didn’t throw your passport at you
Her massive glory: high rises and blue fluffy cloud summer skies,
creating probably the closest thing to home you would get

There’s something about watching someone experience things for the first time
And you were someone who experienced many of my firsts
That’s what makes the connections with people from our homes so special
They know us in our firsts
But there was so much
So much
That I didn’t know, so yeah
You knew me in a way most people in San Diego could never
And one thing I know about coming back home
Is the foundation of firsts is a connection that never goes away
So I’m sorry but it’s unavoidable
I’ll always be here